Guardian writers’ predicted position: 20th (NB: this is not necessarily John Brewin’s prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)
Last season’s position: 3rd (Championship)
Prospects
The last time Luton were promoted to the top division, in 1982, Eric Morecambe, the club’s most famous fan, was still a regular in the tight, archaic Kenilworth Road stands that will offer novelty and discomfort to visiting opposition.
There will be a hubbub of interest in Luton in the opening weeks, nostalgia aplenty for the David Pleat team of the 1980s, Ricky Hill, Radi Antic, plastic pitches and all that, though top-division football will not return to the old place until 1 September. West Ham make a Friday night visit after the home game with Burnley was postponed while a “programme of extensive ground improvements” is carried out. The Hatters’ campaign thus begins with trips to Brighton and Chelsea that could severely test credentials.
In recent years, clubs such as Sheffield United, Brentford and, last season, Bournemouth, have offered a template to survival and Luton certainly offer the work ethic to meet the formula. Whether they have the quality is a rather different question. Promotion was built on a miserly defence that conceded 42 goals in 46 Championship matches, and Ethan Horvath, the American goalkeeper who has returned to Nottingham Forest after a loan, was a big part of that.
In forward Chiedozie Ogbene, signed from Rotherham, and Mads Anderson, Barnsley’s Danish centre-back, a pair of EFL talents have been plundered. Marvelous Nakamba’s loan from Aston Villa being made permanent meanwhile adds some Premier League experience while Tahith Chong, signed for £4m from Birmingham, and Issa Kaboré, loaned from Manchester City, add potential top-level quality to a group that largely came up together and will fight together to make sure that novelty and discomfort aren’t exclusive to those squeezed into Kenilworth Road’s stands.
The manager
Hertfordshire’s folly was Bedfordshire’s gain. Rewind to last summer and Rob Edwards was the progressive manager who was to end Watford’s cut-throat recruitment process. He was sacked on 26 September, and when in November Nathan Jones took the fateful – especially for his new club – decision to leave Luton and take on the challenge at Southampton, Edwards was the beneficiary. Inheriting Jones’s established squad, he took them into the playoffs and got the job completed in the final against Coventry. Watford meanwhile finished 11th. The manager who took Forest Green as high as League One has stayed relatively close to predecessor Jones’s direct approach but has a reputation as being far more holistic than his fellow Welshman.
Leading the shirt sales
Centre-forward is a special position for Luton, from Joe Payne and Gordon Turner to Mick Harford and Brian Stein, and Carlton Morris’s exploits last season, scoring 20 Championship goals, lived up to such club legends. Edwards has pinpointed the former Norwich player’s all-round game as just as important as his goals, from his hold-up play, work-rate, headers, defensive headers in his own box from corners. The one-time England Under-19 striker’s chance of the big league looked to have gone but Morris took on the opportunity to lead Luton’s promotion push with real hunger and at 27, has further to climb in the style of a Callum Wilson or Ivan Toney.
Folk hero
Signing a new contract in July meant Pelly Ruddock Mpanzu could complete the same journey as Luton, from Conference in 2013 to Premier League in 2023. The one-time West Ham trainee has been in the midfield engine room for a decade since making his debut at Alfreton Town in December 2013, though had lost his place at the start of last season. The arrival of Edwards instead of Jones, his long-time mentor, increased his influence on the team, even if he made just 18 Championship starts. “I feel like I’ve completed football,” Mpanzu said after the playoff final but now there is yet more to come.
One to watch
Manchester City snapped up Issa Kaboré from Belgium’s Mechelen as an 18-year-old before loaning the Burkina Faso full-back to the same club, next to City Football Group sister club Troyes, and then Marseille, for whom he played 22 Ligue 1 games last season. Kaboré was a breakout player from last year’s Africa Cup of Nations, and Luton have loaned in a player of attacking quality down the flank as well as defensive strength. His parent club will be carefully watching his development. The much-wanted Roméo Lavia, goalkeeper James Trafford, signed by Burnley, and Pedro Porro, now at Tottenham, each show that following City’s scouting department offers a wealth of available talent from which to hoover up the near-misses or as-yet-unprovens.
• This article was amended on 7 August 2023. An earlier version named Joe Taylor as the one to watch, but Colchester United have signed the Luton Town forward on a season-long loan deal.
